Saturday April 24th in a conference of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement in London.

We had two workshops in the LGCM conference in London.

We were not sure how public this re-enactment was to be, but in the event a team of student journalists video'd the re-enactment and it was recorded for the Sunday programme on Radio 4 the next day. Afterwards Ross Burgess, the narrator and Martin Egan from the Roman Catholic Caucus of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement were interviewed for the Sunday programme and answered questions about the ceremony, and this was interspersed between recordings of the Great Litany and one of the prayers. It was a remarkably full discussion for the Sunday programme.

The extracts that the programme used were the two quotations that are commonly used to suggest that this could not have been a blessing of a gay relationship. One prays that the couple be preserved from scandal (a reference to the martyrs Sergius and Bacchus) and the other states that they are born of God, not by the fleshly lusts of an earthly father, but by faith and the Holy Spirit. Neither Ross nor Martin rushed to defend the text, but merely pointed out that different attitudes had been taken to same-sex relationships that were sexual, at different times in the Church's history.

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In this workshop re-enactment we introduced the topic of sworn kinship very briefly, outlined the teaching of the ceremony that these two may be sworn brothers, but they believe that Christ is God so they are saved by faith and born again by the Holy Spirit (as children of God and thus brothers in Christ)., re-enacted the adelphopoiesis only - though there were hand-outs of the Ordo ad Fratres Faciendum and related topics. And there was a brief time for a discussion afterwards.

The picture above, taken from one of the two workshops illustrates how the Holy Gospel is carried from the altar down to the tetrapod and is placed upright, so it faces the congregation. Our prop is made to resemble a full leather binding, emblazoned with gold and encrusted with jewels. Its main motif is the Greek cross. It is treated like an icon and represents God's news of salvation: the centre of the Christian faith. This is why it is signficant that the Holy Gospel is processed to the the front of the sanctuary and the hands of the couple are placed upon it - this symbolism of this act bases their union on the Christian gospel itself. Later, the Gospel reading from John 17 expands this idea in words.

The script for this event was the same as that used for the SLG event that preceded this one, including a priest and two deacons.

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